Thanks for all your comments, we love hearing from you! We have totally loved the time that we have spent in Vienna. It has catapulted Austria to the top of our favourite places list and we know that we want to come back here already! The whole city is absolutely stunning, every corner has a beautiful building with amazing statues and architecture. We had a long walk to the hotel from the main train station - and it was very hot to be walking so far with our bags!

Our first stop the next morning was St Stephen's Cathedral in the centre of town. It is a huge big black building (though the section they have cleaned is a much lighter colour!). This is a place that Mozart would have been to and performed in. In actual fact, this is where Mozart got married to Constaze Weber! The inside of the church is huge and very impressive The main streets around the church are gorgeous

. Very busy with lots of tourists and also lots of little coffee and cake shops (more on that later!). We then went to the Mozart-Haus where Mozart lived for about 10 years with his family. Some of his most famous works would have been composed here. It was great to see some letters he had written to friends and family on display in the Museum.

We then walked right down the main streets to visit the Vienna Opera House. This is a magnificent building (we quickly decided that next time we come to Vienna it will be to see an opera here!). The tour lasted for around an hour and took us to see some really interesting parts of the building. We got to go backstage and see the huge proportions of the stage area that you don't see from the front part of the building (about three times the siye of the front part of the stage)! We also got to go into the orchestral pit and to sit in the Emperor's box (obviously this was where the best view was from!). Most of the building was destroyed in the war, it was really interestng to hear about how the architects joined the old and new sections and tried to keep the original plans wherever they were able to.

We visited some of the other main sights in the city like Heroes Square, Minoritenkirche and the Hofburg Palace and Apartments

. In the Palace they had big displays about the Hapsburg Dynasty which was very interesting. They also had a floor of silver and ceramic work (took some photos to show you Gran!) In the early evening we went to see Bellevedere Palace (the summer residence of the Royals). Upper Belvedere (the main part of the Palace) is now an art gallery. We saw lots of famous pictures there, the most notable of which was 'The Kiss' by Gutav Klimt. Between Upper and Lower Belvedere there are some beautiful gardens which we walked through. When we got down to the bottom (lower belvedere) some heavy storm clouds were rolling in - we got quite a cool picture!

The next day was one of my favourite so far. We booked a wine tour through the Wachau valley on bikes. We caught the train up to the bottom of the valley (about an hour from Vienna) and then spent the day cycling up the side of a gorgeous river through the vineyards nd winerys hearing about the history of the region. We also got to try some traditional schnaps, local chocolate and apricot jams and an interesting apricot mustard! All in all we cycled about 25km before returning to the train home. The scenary was absolutely spectacular and although the wines we tasted weren't our favourites we have tried (we have high standards having tried wines in NZ last summer!) the ride through the valley and beautiful country-side is one that we will never forget

Comments

Dorothy Hutton
on Aug 5, 2013 at 05:33AM

Yum I remember eating those cakes but we never went inside the Opera House. It is a very cool place and so great that you have been there. Well done with the bike ride in the heat, so much to talk about. I love the photos. Take care

Jessica Shields
on Aug 5, 2013 at 07:14AM

I'm so not surprised that this is your favourite place so far, it seems like it was built for you (or that you were made for it :))